“She’s been with me for three years, and to finally get her a championship,” he said with emotion showing in his voice.

In getting to the championship, Eastern had to overcome some difficulties.

“I hadn’t met most of the players until Wednesday,” said Moriarty.

Despite that, the team went undefeated through the tournament, putting up four wins, no losses and one tie — to Avalon in the round robin.

It was a homecoming of sorts for Moriarty.

“To come home and take one away from the semi-hometeam was special,” he said.

Mackey said after giving up a two-goal advantage, the morale on the bench was at a lowpoint.

“It kind of felt like everyone had given up, but then a couple of players brought the motivation up and everyone started to pick up their game,” she said.

Team Avalon head coach Jeff Garland said the team was disappointed to not get the gold.

“Before we went out there I said, ‘If you wake up tomorrow and in your mind you know that there was nothing you could’ve done different then it doesn’t matter what the outcome of the game was,’” he said. “I still thought we were the better team.”